Wes Lowery to serve as 2017 Undergraduate Commencement speaker

Wes Lowery gives a lecture during the Schuneman Symposium as part of the Scripps College of Communication’s Communication Week on Wednesday, March 29, 2017. / Photo by Jorge Castillo Castro

Wes Lowery to serve as 2017 Undergraduate Commencement speaker

By Sydney Otto

ATHENS, Ohio (April 4, 2017)—This spring, national correspondent for The Washington Post Wesley Lowery will return to Athens to be Ohio University’s 2017 Undergraduate Commencement speaker at the end of April.

Lowery attended Ohio University's E.W. Scripps School of Journalism from 2008 to 2012, and served as the editor-in-chief of The Post, the campus' independent student newspaper.

“Wesley is a great role model for students in the School of Journalism,” said Bob Stewart, director of the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism. “I’m thrilled that he’ll be back on campus to speak to the 2017 graduates.”

He recently returned to campus for Communication Week where he spoke during the Schuneman Symposium about his experiences covering the events that unfolded in Ferguson, Missouri. Lowery and the rest of the team at The Washington Post won a Pulitzer Prize for their coverage of the events as well as their database of police shootings in the United States.

Last fall, Lowery published “They Can’t Kill Us All: Ferguson, Baltimore and a New Era in America’s Racial Justice Movement,” which reached the New York Times bestseller list.

Commencement ceremonies for undergraduates will be held on Saturday, April 29 at 9:30 a.m. and 2 p.m. in the Convocation Center. For more information, visit www.ohio.edu/commencement.